Ziggy - a photo on Flickriver

Ziggy

            Zigzag Bladderwort (Utricularia subulata) - Whites Bog, The Pine Barrens, Pemberton, New Jersey

Many bladderworts grow webs of bladders that support them in the water, but this little guy likes damp, sandy soil barely above the water table, and grows rooted in that sandy substrate.  It's parasitic "bladders" are below the surface of the sand so you won't see them unless you pull one up by the "roots", but if you poke about a bit in the sand you can see it's minute, long, slender leaves borne on basal branches hidden in the wet sand.

It also likes an acidic environment so the tannin rich waters of the Pine Barrens are idea for this litlle guy that doesn't amount to much more than a spindley reddish stalk about he diameter of a pin which is usually no more than 2 inches tall with the occasional specimen reaching a stately height of almost 3 inches! 

I found these guys growing alongside a multitude of Spoon-leaved Sundew (also parasitic), along side an abandoned piece of road that got deep enough into the water table to force traffic to find an alternate route.

A bit of the science on how their trap works
Their trap is created by the semipermeable membrane in their bladder walls that uses osmotic pressure to pump water out of their bladders thereby creating a vacuum.  The prey is then sucked into the bladder when it touches the trigger hairs that surround the trapdoor of the bladder.  Naturally, since the vacuum is created by osmosis (which is driven by the expulsion of dissolved salts through the semipermeable membrane in their bladder walls) these guys can only survive where there are sufficient dissolved salts in the water to create enough vacuum for their bladders to function.  Too much salt is also a problem, so they need very specific concentrations of salts in the water, and will often grow in very specific places (even within the same body of water) depending on the flow patterns of the salt concentrations within their environment.

Note:
Remember that calcium carbonate is a salt, so bladderworts are not restricted to brackish water environments and can also grow in "fresh" water that is high in calcium (i.e. hard water), though in the case of the bladderworts the water would have to be very "hard" to provide enough osmotic pressure for them to survive.

Taken in: United States / New Jersey / Pemberton (show map)

Taken on: April 26, 2012

Tags:

KH0831

PineBarrens

Carnivorous

Plantae

Tracheophytes

Angiosperms

Eudicots

Asterids

Lamiales

Lentibulariaceae

Utricularia

Setiscapella

subulata

Utricularia subulata

cleistogama

Macro

New Jersey

New

Jersey « less

Sets appears in: • 2012 • Carnivorous Plants more » • Flora • Macro Photography • Wild Flowers • New Jersey • NJ, Pine Barrens • NJ, Nature « less

Groups appears in: • Carnivorous Plants • NJ Pine Barrens more » • US Wildflowers « less

Camera: Canon EOS 5D Mark II, f/32.0, 0.5 sec, 180mm, ISO 400 (more info) (hide info)

Camera:	Canon EOS 5D Mark II
Lens:	EF180mm f/3.5L Macro USM
Aperture:	f/32.0
Exposure Time:	0.5
Focal Length:	180mm
ISO:	400
Exposure Bias:	+1 EV
Flash:	Off, Did not fire
Exposure Program:	Aperture-priority AE
Exposure Mode:	Auto bracket
Metering Mode:	Multi-segment
White Balance:	Auto
Color Space:	Uncalibrated
Software:	Adobe Photoshop CS4 Windows
Show full info

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